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| - Teaser: The Well Company stands for better life and living. This episode is all about this fair dotcom and its long way down. Background Material: Excerpt from "The Economist, Octobre 2005" Being one of the top-most productive and biggest pharmaceutical companies operating on global scale, The Well Company - beside its scale - specializes in only two medical branches: genetic catalogueing and viral sciences. It began as an university off-shoot in 1979, made some impressive deals in the 90es and functions nowadays as a mother company through lots of smaller firms or project teams. The Well Company has actually not much of a workforce compared to its competition but its success stems from a seamingly constant series of breakthroughs in science and rapid commercial usage of these scientific achievements. In the pharmaceutical business even other big players admit that The Well Company is more often than not the authority on viral research. But rumour has it, as so often, that investors of The Well Company were beginning to doubt this seemingly perfect story of success for quite some time when a scandal last year made its way to the public. Members of middle management from the US branch went to the press with discriminating documents about accounting fraud and managerial failures as well as conspiracy of tremendous proportion. It did not bode well for American stock market when money was fastly pulled out and shares of The Well Company fell over night for about 400%. So was it all a ruse, a bitter pill as brokers would call it when false information is introduced into a market to make stock cheap and then having buyers their cheap share of the company? It does seem to be true that there is something fishy going on and not all is well at The Well Company. For instance when Peter R. Kann, chairman and chief executive officer of Dow Jones & Company, filed in a charge a month ago against Milford Kayne, former CEO of The Well Company, under the title of "Suspicion of manipulation of stocks and commodities". Needless to say that the laywers of Mr. Kayne denied any whatsoever claims. But if Dow Jones is going legal, evidence is expected to follow. So what about competition? As eager as a functioning market can be, market value of The Well Company has risen again in no time. Some other pharmaceuticals were fast to buy into the storm ridden holding and are struggling for control of the highly profitable firm which still counts as leading in viral science. Who or if this battle has already been won, is not yet clear but management is rapidly adapting to the new situation and lower fundings. Headquarters are said to be transferred from the US to somewhere in Europe. It is a cost decision, they say. Nobody knows exactly where their new home will be but it will be a good indication of the future owner-structure of The Well Company. Lets hope that at least they know how to manage books and keep in mind that good intentions do not suffice for a healthy business. Theme: This means conspiracy and horror in todays corporate world. Because if something is not well, enter the consultants and have them make some checks and analysis. If somebody can dig up something then them. Hopefully they'll live to tell about it... Cast of characters:
* One sleek face of a consultant
* Your best-buddy-psychologist Rating: Not advised for pupils under the age of 18. This story contains mature content.
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